The 13th Warrior

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The is Bull, The 13th Warrior. He was rescued from a local auction. Starving, battered, bruised, and exhausted, we brought him home for $250. We knew he had a long road head of him, so we gave him a good strong name to help keep him strong. It was March 2003 we rescued a Belgian draft gelding from an auction. As we found out later, He started his journey in the winter of 02. He was an old (22) work horse that probably started loosing too much weight and then was promptly taken to the local horse auction to be ditched before he started costing his owners money. Bad news, the nearest auction was The New Holland Horse Auction in PA. They are probably the biggest sellers of horse meat on the east coast. By some miracle he left with a horse dealer not the meat man. Well, after years of abuse (and the scars to prove it) he bounced from trader to trader. All the while getting thinner and thinner. Finally he made it to our local auction. I went with a friend to look for a horse for her. But, The second I saw this poor horse I knew he was coming home with me. I told my husband, at the very least we can give him a humane end to an awful life, like the SOB that used him up and threw him away should have!" "Our 1st call was to the vet. After an exam and blood work we decided that he might be able to make it. The only thing we could not identify were 2 hard lumps on ether side of his neck. They did not appear to be a problem, so we decided to worry about them later if he even survived. Well after 2 months in a pasture Bull got really sick. We rushed him to NC State Vet School Hospital. They scoped him and found nearly a foot of "food" stuck in his throat. They had to DRILL the mass, and it wasn't going well. They found food in his neck that I never fed him, like CORN! They figure he probably started having a problem with choke a while back, but was never properly treated. That was most likely the reason for his sale in the 1st place. Of course, now we knew what those 2 strange lumps on his neck were, hard masses of food product collected in "pockets" in his throat caused by chronic choke. After 24 hours my husband and I had decided that if they couldn't remove the mass, we would have him put down. We were just thankful for the 2 good months we had. After another 24 hours they called us to let us know they finally cleared all the "food" out of his throat, and he was ready to come home! Everyone was amazed. It took 2 full days of drilling and flushing to remove all the crap that had built up in his throat, and all the while he was a perfect gentleman. Before sending him home they weighed him on their scale. He was only 1250lb, after 2 months of GAINING weight. Over time Bull improved both physically and mentally. He had many scars from his younger days. That dent in his neck just in front of his withers was a full 1in deep indent from the harness that didn't fit him. He also had a string of bald scars around his neck from the same harness. They where so scarred the hair never did grow back. He was very suspicious of people, and would literally cringe when you reached your hand out to him. The happy ending? Bull grew to a whopping 2500lb! He figured out we were not going to hurt him and just loved being ridden on the trails here. He also gave lessons here to both the kids and adults. He was always the 1st to the gate to greet you. He finally had the life every horse dreams of, food to eat, kids to love him, and a family that would never sell him. Sadly, at the age of 26 we had to put Bull to sleep due to internal bleeding and an abdominal abcess. We were blessed with the ability to give this great horse what he deserved after years of service to humans, a dignified and PAINLESS death. He is buried in the pasture so he can be with us forever."

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Category: Animals
Uploaded: May 15th, 2008 @ 8:44 pm
Author: doublegstable

Length: 02:45
Rating:
Views: 134

Tags: abused auction belgian draft ending happy horse love onetruemedia rescue slaughter starving

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